


The Malcontent and the Mercenary

by januaryjune



Category: Star Trek: Voyager
Genre: Episode: s05e22 Someone To Watch Over Me, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-14
Updated: 2020-04-14
Packaged: 2021-03-01 18:46:50
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 5,492
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23651797
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/januaryjune/pseuds/januaryjune
Summary: B'Elanna and Tom are two very big personalities on one very small ship.
Relationships: Seven of Nine & B'Elanna Torres, Tom Paris/B'Elanna Torres
Comments: 47
Kudos: 40





	1. B'Elanna

**Author's Note:**

> This fic starts at the end of Juggernaut and goes into the events of STWOM. Of course, Tuvok said that line about the Maquis being "malcontents, outlaws, and mercenaries" way back in Meld. It's meant to be about B'Elanna and Tom adjusting to how they've grown a bit tamer after 4-5 years in the Delta Quadrant, but it went in all sorts of directions!

_Maquis_. Named for the French Resistance fighters during Earth’s World War II, who were named for the wild country hills they occupied, not unlike the DMZ. Sveta told her about them once. Anarchists. Guerrilla warriors of all ages and backgrounds.

But when they needed agents to infiltrate the Nazis, they often recruited clever, inconspicuous young women. 

B’Elanna Torres knew she was a rebel, in the way some people are born to be. It wasn’t glamorous or terrible, it was just a fact. Rebels had short fuses. From the moment she set foot on Voyager, her major problem had been _rules_. Rules had a way of sacrificing people’s lives indiscriminately. They certainly did on a Malon freighter.

As she felt those longed-for sonic pulses massaging her clean, B”Elanna closed her eyes and decided to stop thinking about all of it. There was something about keeping her _temper in check_ , as Chakotay called it, which made her feel tamed. Defeated. Stripped of her anger, she felt exposed. Maybe Tuvok was right. 

She draped the lightweight blue nightgown over her body and reached for her hairbrush. She had barely emerged from the bathroom when the door chimed, and she smirked because there was no question who it was. “Oh just _come in_ already,” she said, trying badly to attempt playfulness. 

But when Tom walked through the door, he was smirking too. He took a few steps toward her and stopped, cocking his head. “You want to talk about it?”

“Absolutely not,” she answered, but her tone was exhausted, not hostile.

“You okay?”

She paused. “I’m better now that you’re here.”

He visibly brightened at her answer and began to peel off his uniform. She watched his fingers unfasten his jacket and smiled at the speed with which he kicked off his boots. 

It was endearing and a little heartbreaking the way the smallest display of softness from her meant so much to him. He could be such an infuriating fucking infant sometimes, but when everyone else was lecturing her about her emotions, he’d done nothing but support her. He wanted her to be _helped_. 

Right or wrong, Tom had a way of putting her ahead of the ship. Ahead of the rules. It was just his instinct, and she tried to remember that when he forgot to show up for dates and had tantrums that rivaled her own.

“Hey,” she said suddenly. His chest was now bare, and she snaked one arm up his neck and stroked his cheek with her other hand. He wrapped his arms around her waist and looked at her.

“Yeah?”

“I just wanted to say thanks.”

“For what?”

“For what you said before I left. For not letting me pick a fight. For believing in me. I should have said thanks.”

There was probably an apology in there somewhere, but she wasn’t going to articulate it. She wouldn’t have had time anyway, because Tom immediately gathered material from her nightgown in his fist and pressed her closer, leaning down to press his hot, soft mouth against hers. He was insistent but not rough, and he barely pulled back. Just enough so she could feel his breath warm on her face.

“I always believe in you,” he said, as though it was obvious. 

It seemed like he wanted to say more, but of course, Tom _always_ wanted to say more. Luckily, not as much as he wanted to take off her nightgown. She lifted her arms and let him, feeling the stiffness in her muscles left behind by the away mission that was probably half from swinging pipes and messing with jammed airlocks and half from sheer pent-up stress. As if he could read her mind, Tom slid his hands over her neck and shoulders, pressing and rubbing her skin while she unfastened his pants.

They went slow, as they sometimes did, and Tom’s kisses were methodical. He covered her breasts and collarbone section by section, like he was mapping her. He’d been like this when he came back from the gravity well, where he’d gone three months without seeing her and barely any time had passed on _Voyager_. A part of him seemed changed from that experience still. 

“You smell like you,” he said, his face buried in her chest. 

“I hope that’s a good thing,” she laughed.

He lifted his head and smiled up at her, enamored. “It’s the best thing.”

Soon, he dove into her mouth and she parted her legs, burrowing into the mattress to make room for him. When it was over, they found themselves propped at a strange angle on the pillows, with her cheek leaned on his hair and his arm across her hip. He pinched the round curve of her flesh absentmindedly, and she traced the space between his shoulder blades.

“Tom?”

“B’Elanna.”

“What’s a malcontent?”

He lifted his head, perplexed, and snort-laughed. “You.”

“What’s _that_ mean?” She prepared to be offended.

“A malcontent is like… someone constantly unhappy with the rules. A rebel with a good cause.”

“Oh.” She wasn’t offended.

“Why? Did someone call you that?”

“Not exactly.” She turned in his arms so she was more on her side and could look at him clearly. “Harry might have _accidentally_ told me that Tuvok offered to beam to the freighter and take over for Chakotay because he thought I couldn’t handle it. So I was thinking about the time I heard him tell Chakotay that his Maquis were a bunch of malcontents, outlaws, and mercenaries. Just wondering which one I was.”

Tom frowned a little, and she could tell he was bothered at Tuvok’s lack of faith in her, which made B’Elanna smile. “Well,” he finally said. “You’re definitely the malcontent. I’m definitely the mercenary. Chakotay can be the outlaw, because that one’s the most boring.”

She pet his sweaty neck and snickered appreciatively. “We’re not those things anymore though, are we? I’m not really rebelling--”

“And I prefer to compromise my morals for free now,” said Tom, grinning as he kissed her.

“I’m being serious.” She caught his bottom lip between her teeth and pressed her hips into his groin, but she sighed. “The Maquis used to be where I put all this rage. All this crazy, angry passion I had and didn’t know what to do with. And now they’re gone. But I still feel it.”

“You can give it to me.”

It was a sweet thing to say, and she knew he meant it. A few months ago, she’d expected him to leave her when he found out what she’d been keeping from him, including the extent of her depression and emotional distance. It wasn’t long into her recovery that she realized she’d been so afraid of losing him - so afraid that he’d grow to hate her, or that he’d go on some dangerous away mission and not come back - that she’d shut off her feelings entirely. It was the same with everything. And somehow, against all odds, they emerged even closer to each other, as if they’d committed to their relationship in a new way. They still argued a lot, but somewhere along the line, the arguing became alright. It was scarier when they stopped. 

“You don’t have to say that, Tom.”

“It’s true. Everything you feel. I can handle it.”

He was looking at her so earnestly that every remnant of her bad mood fell away, and she pulled his face down onto hers. She loved to feel his flushed cheeks under her hands.

“I suppose I could make you a good deal, _mercenary_ ,” she said breathlessly.

\-----------------------------------------

The next morning, he walked her to Engineering. They didn’t hold hands, but every time Tom spoke he would touch her shoulder or lower back in this funny way he had that B’Elanna liked unless she was in a real rage. It was an hour before alpha shift, and the corridors were sparsely populated, though they passed Seven of Nine as she stepped out of the turbolift. She looked as pristine as usual, and she was intent on a PADD. 

“Hi Seven,” said Tom.

“Morning,” said B’Elanna.

She inclined her head at them as they passed. “Lieutenants.”

Tom continued with the story he was telling about the great horror of letting Culhane pilot the Delta Flyer. “I told him he was going to burn out the thrusters but he never listens to me. It’s like everything is a talent show with this guy--”

They paused at the replicator, and he was touching her back again. “Want a raktajino? I’m rich this week.”

“Sure. That’s nice of you.”

“Only the best for the chief engineer.”

As he got her coffee, B’Elanna glanced down the hallway and saw Seven of Nine. Again. Still with her PADD, having made equal progress down Deck Eleven. She looked up at B’Elanna briefly, then looked down again as if nothing was amiss. B’Elanna inched closer to Tom.

“Is she… following us?”

Tom handed her the glass mug of frothy coffee and chuckled. “Little paranoid, don’t you think?”

B’Elanna only shrugged. She lowered her voice to a whisper so that Seven wouldn’t hear. “She was in the hallway outside my quarters last week, remember? You thought it was weird. You said, _what’s Seven doing on Deck Nine? Does she have a secret rendez-vous?_ But she was just typing on that PADD.”

Of course, Tom would remember the day she was talking about. They got into a heated argument about the Pacific Coast Highway holodeck program. He’d been promising for weeks to use it to take her to the beach - Malibu, or maybe Big Sur - only to put it off for one reason or another, and she’d found out he was using it for Harry’s first driving lesson instead. Which was meant to take place in a couple days, because B’Elanna had finally thrown her hands in the air and said _do whatever you want_ , right before she stopped speaking to him altogether.

There had been a note of genuine hurt in her voice, and she couldn’t hide it from Tom anymore. They knew each other too well. Enough that he showed up after his shift with a bouquet of roses and a string of apologies for being such a terrible boyfriend. _You’re not_ , she told him. _But sometimes you have the emotional maturity of a tribble._

“Come to think of it,” B’Elanna continued as they walked further along the hall, “she was outside the shuttle bay when you came back too. I even asked her about the radiation flux from that asteroid you were tailing.”

“Sounds normal.”

But then she didn’t leave” 

“You should just let it go,” Tom said. He sighed and finally took her hand as they reached Engineering. 

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, maybe she did have a secret rendez-vous. Maybe she wanted to scan the Flyer. Maybe she’s got work to do in Engineering. Ask her.”

The doors parted as he spoke, and B’Elanna was stung by his slight lack of patience, but she let him go on.

“If you stew about it all day, you’re just going to find a reason to get angry about Seven because you have nothing else to be angry about and you don’t know how to relax and just not be... “

“Angry,” she finished for him.

“Exactly.” 

Once upon a time, she would have yelled at him for saying such a thing. Right in front of the dozen or so officers scattered at their consoles, who still tried their best not to look directly at the couple, even though their obvious couple-dom had long ago become old news. But B’Elanna had exhausted herself too many times, and it was hard to deny that he had a point.

She stepped into her office.“ Okay, you’re right.”

Tom briefly followed, then staggered back as if struck. “Wow, what did the Malon do to you?”

“Aren’t you late for bridge duty?” She grabbed his chin affectionately and tried to look threatening at the same time. He leaned down and kissed her.

“I love you, you malcontent.”

“Famous last words.”

As he walked out of Engineering, she saw Seven turn to watch him, curiously. B’Elanna still didn’t trust her, but then again, she never had. And people tended to watch Tom Paris curiously all the time.

_Stardate 52652: Subjects emerged together from female’s quarters at approximately 0530. Male was predictably tactile and verbose. Female seems to prefer being coerced into affection with Klingon coffee._


	2. Tom

_Well I’m going out west where I belong, Where the days are short and the nights are long. Where I’ll walk and they’ll walk, and I’ll twist and they twist, where I’ll shimmy and they’ll shimmy, and I’ll fly--_

The radio on the Mustang blared, and Tom drummed along on the tops of his legs as Harry finally slid into the driver’s seat. The ensign made a face at him, “What is this music?”

Tom rolled his eyes a second before slipping his sunglasses on, blocking out a little of the picturesque sunny day on Holodeck Two. “You and B’Elanna. Couple of nerds. Sorry it’s not the San Francisco Junior Clarinet Club.”

He expected Harry to retort, but he just turned the key in the engine carefully and waited for it to rumble to life. “Is she still mad at you?” he finally asked.

“Who, B’Elanna? Nah. I don’t think so, anyway.”

“Because I don’t want her to be mad at me by association.”

“Relax, Harry. She’ll be working on that diagnostic all day. Just go easy on the clutch.”

The top was down, and Tom wore a short-sleeved Hawaiian shirt. He draped his arm over the door and looked out at the palm trees and line of shops and stands. There were people on roller skates in halter tops and tye dye, old men sitting on benches feeding seagulls, couples coming in and out of VW bugs or off the backs of motorcycles. Venice Beach. A spot that didn’t exist anymore on Earth. But the strange, beautiful memory of it existed in his mind, enough for him to construct a fairly decent option in his series of California programs. B’Elanna might even like it. 

Tom Paris was claustrophobic, and to him, it was an all-encompassing state of mind. His discomfort extended beyond stasis chambers. A small ship populated with the same hundred-and-fifty-odd people was suffocating in itself. Routine was suffocating. Even his wild, brilliant, beautiful girlfriend, a woman he adored to the end of the galaxy and back, sometimes made him feel like he couldn’t breathe.

And he made her feel like she couldn’t breathe too. That’s why she understood when he had to drive fast on the holodeck or pilot a shuttle in dizzying loops around an asteroid, even if it annoyed her. Their solidarity, the way they were more similar than different at their core, was what kept them glued together when the odds were against them. That and the sex.

Their complicated friendship with Harry Kim wasn’t as much of a point of contention as it might have been. Harry rooted for them as a couple. Tom had simply asked, _Is this weird?_ And Harry answered, _Weird that it took so long!_

It was the fact that when Tom was doing stupid stuff, Harry was usually with him, that was a point of contention. And Tom often preferred doing stupid stuff to anything else.

With a few starts and stops that made Tom’s internal organs lurch, Harry pulled the car out of the sandy parking lot and pointed it, miraculously, toward the on ramp. It was silly that he worried so much about giving Harry control of a vehicle he could fix with a few simple commands, but Tom built that engine over Voyager’s first three years, and the Mustang’s photons were as real to him as the Doctor.

“Good,” said Tom. “Now make sure you shift gears in time to give it enough oomph for the traffic flow.”

“Oomph?”

“It’s a technical term.”

Despite the fact that it was his own idea, Harry didn’t look very comfortable driving the Mustang. For a moment, Tom imagined B’Elanna telling him what she’d told Tom the other day, about all the rage and passion she channeled through the Maquis that she didn’t have anywhere to put anymore. Harry wouldn’t understand something like that. Nothing against him, he was like a brother - a very nervous, high-strung little brother in chinos and a polo shirt. But he was all Starfleet. 

“You sure you don’t want sunglasses?” Tom asked.

“They obstruct my vision. I need to see what I’m doing.” 

Tom tried to hide his amusement and the need to ask if they were going to sit there spinning the wheels all day, or if they were going to drive. Suddenly, they were going backwards with much too much speed.

“Harry, what the hell are you doing? It’s in reverse!”

“I can’t get it out of reverse!”

Tom tried to grab the gear stick, unsure that it would even help, when they crashed right into Tio Tonio’s Burritos, and the sound of customers fleeing in panic made him wince. 

Harry had slammed on the breaks a little too late, and he turned the key in the ignition again and threw his hands up like he refused to touch it. 

Tom turned slowly to see a sizzling metal pan clank against the bumper and fall. A vat of something green and full of spices sat overturned in the back seat. “Guacamole,” he said to nobody in particular.

“Who’s going to pay for this?” said Tio Tonio, a giant man who emerged from behind the counter smearing his hands angrily on his apron. “We could have been killed!”

Tom and Harry exchanged glances. “Computer, end program,” they said at the same time. So much for oomph.

\------------------

After Harry went back on duty, Tom walked through the halls in his jeans and Hawaiian shirt, and everyone he passed smiled and said hello. It was different for him, after nearly five years on _Voyager_. When he came on board, people looked down their noses (even when he was much taller) and refused to shake his hand, and now, it was like everyone had collective amnesia and he’d always been this charming, affable guy who got along with them easily.

He’d started to notice it after his demotion. It wasn’t as if Janeway was disliked by the crew, but when Tom got out of the brig there had been countless offers to help with projects in the shuttle bay, offers to switch shifts so he could spend more time with B’Elanna, displays of loyalty he had never asked for, drinks being passed his way at the bar in Sandrine’s, invitations to card games... Not to mention a string of officers he’d spoken to a handful of times simply telling him _I’m on your side_. 

It was nice. He finally felt like he was doing more than choosing the path his father had wanted for him, at last - he was doing it on his own terms. But he couldn’t help also feeling like he’d lost track of a side of himself he once depended on. The last mercenary thing he did was negotiate with Neelix for enough ration credit to replicate pork rinds. The favors he traded should never be mentioned.

He’d once thought the Maquis were going to put him in Sickbay eventually, but now they clapped him on the shoulder and smiled.

_They know what it’s like to believe in something and not give a damn about the consequences_ , B’Elanna had told him.

B’Elanna. Tom thought about her working all day in Engineering and wondered, with great affection, if she had really yelled at anybody yet. He tapped his combadge. “Paris to Torres.”

“Torres here.”

“Are you free for dinner, Chief?”

“Hmm… meet you in the mess hall in an hour?”

“Does that really mean two hours?”

He could hear her tiny laugh. “An hour and a half?”

“You’ve got a deal. Paris out.”

He headed to his quarters to shower and change back into his uniform, and he still managed to beat B’Elanna to the mess, which was no surprise. Neelix was in the galley, and Tom leaned over the counter to ask him if he had those tall yellow candles B’Elanna liked when he saw Seven of Nine come through the doors. She really was everywhere lately.

_Stardate 52654, 1400 hours: Male intends to seduce female with a romantic dinner after approximately twelve hours apart. Are these gestures necessary?_


	3. A Nightcap

“I told you so!”

B’Elanna had plenty of occasions to use these words on Tom, but to her credit, she didn’t often bother. Tonight, though, she barked them as sharp as an ice pick the second he managed to get her inside his quarters. 

It was fair. She got angry a lot more than was good for her, but she was usually right, and Seven of Nine had been no exception. 

“I’m sorry,” Tom said wearily. “Come on, do you think we really could have predicted she was taking notes on us? Is that what you thought it was?”

He sank onto the arm of the sofa and watched her consider this for a moment, before her expression relaxed just a flicker. She turned her blazing dark eyes on him.

“Why aren’t you mad?”

He shrugged. “I’m not happy about it. Especially cause I know how much that kind of thing bothers you. But she was assimilated when she was six…”

“Oh not another speech on how we should all feel sorry for the Borg and she doesn’t mean to be an emotionless, rude robotic dictator.”

Tom snickered a little and went to the replicator, where he quickly fetched her a gin and tonic. “Drink this. I’m dead serious.” He handed her the glass like he was prescribing it.

B’Elanna glared at him but obeyed. 

“What I mean is, she’s never been in love. She’s never had sex. She thinks she knows about that stuff cause she’s assimilated a gazillion people, but she’s never had something like that for herself. Now that she’s human, we are the closest example she has of _romance_. Or two people being connected. It’s kind of flattering, in a way. Totally not okay! But I get it.”

Despite herself, the corner of B’Elanna’s mouth turned up a little. She sank down on the couch cushions and put her glass on the coffee table. “Tom. That’s sweet, but she was listening to us fight and fuck, she wasn’t studying our connection.”

He was more than used to B’Elanna lacking the ability to idealize their relationship as much as he did. So it didn’t offend him anymore, he just laughed to himself while he made his own drink. “Maybe I’m an exhibitionist.”

She didn’t need to tell him that she wasn’t one at all. She couldn’t afford to be. Ever since the beginning, when Janeway had dressed them down for their little hormonal spike, B’Elanna had been confronted with the reality of how much everyone on the ship _talked_ , and how she couldn’t let her job, which half of them never thought she deserved anyway, be undermined by her feelings for another senior officer. Feelings that were, for a while anyway, overwhelming and hard to hide. But which became something she didn’t really want to share.

She knew it was fucked. There were times when one of them had been seriously injured, lost, or in real danger, and they were just supposed to carry on with their job and not acknowledge it. It wouldn’t have been like that in the Maquis. 

She imagined explaining this to Seven of Nine. It wasn’t something you could understand just from typing notes in a PADD. 

He sat down next to her and put his warm hand on her shoulder, immediately letting it snake around to the back of her neck. “What are you thinking?” he asked.

“Just about what you said. Romance. How we’re so much more than human mating behavior.”

He grinned, pleased. “So you’re not mad at me?”

“No, I am. You never listen to me. You treat me like I’m insane.”

“I know you’re not insane. You’re almost never wrong, actually.”

“Almost?”

“Okay, you’re never wrong,” he said, and he smoothed back her hair. “But I still think you ought to let things go. Just for your own sake.”

She hadn’t told him about Tuvok calling her Miss Turtle Head. _You are easily provoked_ , he’d said. She knew Tom would agree. 

“I’m going to put her on report.”

Tom couldn’t hide his amused expression, because he did think her outrage was kind of adorable sometimes. Of course, this only made B’Elanna angrier, and she nearly hissed at him as she turned away and grabbed her drink again.

“This isn’t working,” said B’Elanna. 

“What isn’t?” For a moment, he was scared that she meant their relationship. 

“The nightcap.” 

She swallowed down the synthehol and placed her tumbler next to his. Then, without preamble, she stood up and overturned the coffee table. Both drinks spilled onto the carpet, and she looked vaguely satisfied. 

“B’Elanna, what the hell?” Tom stood up, and she was relieved that he finally seemed angry too. Or at least annoyed. 

“Do you think your neighbors are listening to us like mine do?” she asked, backing up towards his bookshelf. She tipped it forward until a few of his old-fashioned hardcover volumes fell onto the floor, pages fluttering.

“Hey!” He went after her, and she put up her fists instinctively, bracing them against his chest while he grabbed her by the shoulders. He saw the look in her eye - challenging, playful - and he spun her around against the wall before he kissed her hard.

She pressed her knuckles against his ribs so hard that it hurt, but she kissed him back.

Tom reached over to the left, where a tacky gold plaque with a Starfleet insignia that came with the room hung on the wall. He knocked it off, and it clattered to the floor.

B’Elanna bared her teeth and initiated another kiss, this time tugging him down to her level. He understood her, on instinct. They were just a couple of rebels who couldn’t breathe. 

“Exhibitionist,” she muttered, rolling her eyes and shaking her head. “You’re such a pig, Paris.”

He felt her wet mouth and sharp teeth on his ear and neck. 

\--------------

Tom felt several thousand light years away from the person he was when he first designed Sandrine’s on the holodeck, much less when he frequented the real one. But that didn’t mean he wasn’t irritated by the way it looked now. 

His natural inclination towards self-absorption sometimes made him forget that they’d all grown up on this ship together, or at least grown older. Everyone was changed and a bit weathered by their time in the Delta Quadrant, and the fact that pool tournaments and wild nights at the bar had become less frequent was only natural. There were still betting lines and poker games, but these things happened between old friends now. Old friends who were tired.

Sandrine’s had the air of a classy wine bar now, complete with an old piano and a gathering of well-behaved, well-dressed patrons. He didn’t like it. It wasn't accurate, or as accurate as his faulty drunken memory could be, which was good enough for good times on this ship. As Tom got his drink at the bar, he thought about times he’d spent there when he first came on board. He was embarrassed of many of them, but he missed them too.

The Doctor had definitely deleted his pool table.

He’d meant what he said about Seven to B’Elanna. If she wanted to learn about romance, fine - that, too, was only natural. He didn’t wish her any ill. But the Doc was just so damn annoying. Tom got his drink at the bar and watched him watching Seven with that smug look on his face, saying things like _school is in session_ and _you might learn something_. Tom, who was much less stupid than he looked, realized that this was likely the Doc’s response to finding out that Seven was taking field notes on his real, actual, messy, complicated, longterm relationship. Teaching her to make small talk with a holographic bar patron and then acting like he understood human connection. 

Most conversations with the Doctor made him understand what it was like for B’Elanna to have a conversation with Seven of Nine. That barely-contained urge to scream.

So what trouble could he make? “Put your latinum where your mouth is.” 

He’d thought B’Elanna would like it. He could still be a mercenary after all.


	4. Epilogue

_Stardate 52661, 2100 hours: Subjects quarrel in corridor outside female’s quarters._

Talk about a paradoxical, state-dependent associative phenomenon. 

Deck Nine, Section Twelve. Seven of Nine approached B’Elanna’s quarters with nothing but good intentions, but she stopped in her tracks when she heard the yelling and briefly considered what she should do. She didn’t want anyone to catch her listening to them and set the dissemination of information back to its original parameters. But then she heard Tom say her name. 

“You don’t even _like_ Seven!”

“That’s ridiculous. If you had made a bet about my personal life with the Doctor, I would never speak to you again. I don’t care who you do it to, it’s wrong!”

Tom looked flabbergasted. “He still helped her with her social skills! Seven could meet a nice guy!”

“Well I hope she has better luck with that than I did.”

Tom’s jaw dropped, and even from a distance, it was obvious to Seven that she’d really _hurt his feelings_ , as they say. “You don’t think I’m nice? I’m a nice guy! I’m very easygoing.”

B’Elanna laughed for about fifteen seconds. “No! Do you think _I’m_ nice?”

“No! But that’s different!”

Now they were both a little stung. The silence hung in the air for a moment, but Tom was always game to be the first to patch it up.

“B’Elanna, you are an endlessly frustrating, tiny ball of abject terror who makes being impossible look like an art form. And you are the smartest, most fascinating, forthright, loyal, passionate, and generally marvelous woman I’ve ever talked into putting up with me.”

Standing in her doorway, she softened just enough. “Well. You are a selfish, childish, insufferable bastard. And you’re the most… courageous, loving, charming, hilarious, one-of-a-kind man that I’ve ever chosen not to blow out an airlock. Yet. That’s better than nice.”

Seven frowned in baffled fascination as they suddenly broke into grins and kissed, the hostilities ceasing abruptly. B’Elanna pulled Tom quickly into her quarters, and Seven assumed it would be prudent to come back later.

\----------------

Three hours passed, and she was about to retire to the cargo bay when she found herself on Deck Nine once again. The only sounds coming from inside B’Elanna’s quarters now were murmurs and soft laughter. Nothing that the neighbors could complain about.

She rang the door chime. After a moment, B’Elanna answered. She wore a silk robe over her nightgown and looked perplexed. “Seven. What’s wrong, why didn’t you comm me?”

Tom’s voice came from the shadows beyond B’Elanna, and she turned her head. “I’ll be right back,” she said to him, and she shut the door so that the two women stood in the hall. 

“There is no emergency. I’m sorry to disturb you, Lieutenant. I wanted to… apologize.”

B’Elanna knew instantly that this wasn’t being carried out in a very logical way, but apologizing was never easy for her either so she was willing to reign in her temper.

“Apologize?”

“For my research. On you and Lieutenant Paris. Recently, I have gained a greater understanding of how it feels to have outside parties invest in your personal life.”

B’Elanna nodded. “I heard about that. I’m sorry it happened. I wouldn’t have liked it.”

“I do not believe either the Doctor or Lieutenant Paris had malicious intent. But thank you, Lieutenant. It’s… _no big deal_ , as they say.”

“No big deal for me either. I might have overreacted a little. It’s okay.”

Seven nodded curtly. She was about to say goodnight, but B’Elanna smoothed her own hair behind her ears and cleared her throat - a curious gesture which seemed to indicate she had something else to say.

“Seven?”

“Yes, Lieutenant?”

“If you want to know something, you could just ask.”

Seven tilted her head. The two women had clashed from the beginning, and the Doctor had often said it was because they were polar opposites. Seven had to relearn how to feel any emotions. Most of the time, B’Elanna felt all of them.

“You would share information with me about mating behavior?”

“No!” said B’Elanna, and a bit of her usual ire came back to her voice. “But maybe other things.”

“Love?”

B’Elanna didn’t answer, but she gave a small - very small - smile.


End file.
